fuck this job.com

Have you ever felt completely stuck and unable to move ? That's how I feel now. I've worked for the same company for nearly 20 years. Hang on, I've read the blogs here and can hear some of you saying 'what a loser', but no - hear me out.

Up to 5 years ago I ***LOVED*** my job, really loved it. Full of interesting technical things to do, new technologies etc. I worked with a bunch of great people, sure there were some odd characters that you learned to live with but generally a great mix of talent and all people that you could respect for what they brought to the party.

I pretty much stumbled into management, a case of being in the right place at the right time but never really wanting to leave behind the practical side of what I did.

And that's where it's all gone t*ts up... through major changes, buyouts etc everything has changed to the point that it's unrecognisable. There are a few people left from the original group, still very talented but now spread about in unconnected groups that aren't encouraged to talk to each other.

Outsourcing, process management and redundancies are now the mantra. Slowly I can see all of the technical talent being tupe'd to outsource suppliers or made redundant. The only growth is in service managers to kick the a*ses of the service suppliers when something goes wrong. Every time there's a fault somewhere there's a whole army of these people screaming for a root cause analysis within 12 hours and wanting to know where the service improvement plan is. Hey - here's the news guys - IT BROKE, IT GOT FIXED, end of story. Nobody died.

Why are the number of faults going up ? Simple. The new owners have reduced staff by probably 30% in a year, and are now setting about switching major critical suppliers of IT services simultaneously. Brilliant idea.

I'd love to poke two fingers up to them and walk, but like most people I have a mortgage and a family to feed. I'd love to get made redundant - It would scare the hell out of me but it would give me the kick up the a*se to go find something more fulfilling though if I'm honest I don't think I'll ever enjoy a job as much as I used to enjoy this one.

As I've been here a while redundancy would allow me to make a big cut in my mortgage, which is important as my salary is unquestionably good (I know - I should feel lucky to be better off than most).

And here's the problem - If I stay I'm going to go mad slowly or choke the living sh*t out of the next person who mentions RCA or SIP whilst talking to me. If I leave, I blow any chance of getting that fat redundancy cheque that so many of my colleagues have received.

I guess there's three things I want to say here:

Middle management is a crappy place to be - sure you get more money, but once you get used to it, they have you by the balls. And you get to deal with sh*t from above and below for your trouble.

If your'e happy doing what you're doing, stick with it. Don't be tempted by bright lights and promises that you can be in the thick of it influencing things. Its cr*p, policy comes from the top, you can express an opinion but don't ever kid yourself that anyone is listening.

If you don't like what you're doing, get out - now. Any time you spend staying put is wasted time, and the longer you leave it the harder it will be to change.

*** Thanks for your time ***